


Some days are good, most days are bad, other days are horrific

by Gyakugire



Category: Death Note
Genre: Comfort, M/M, matt tries to help, mello's a mess, nice
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-03-04
Updated: 2016-03-04
Packaged: 2018-05-24 15:49:19
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,472
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6158676
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Gyakugire/pseuds/Gyakugire
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"Matt knows someone’s dead before Mello’s even all the way in the apartment."</p>
            </blockquote>





	Some days are good, most days are bad, other days are horrific

Work like this is dirty. It’s meant for people that aren’t really _people_. That don’t mind dirtying their hands, taking life, playing their games without listening to a single rule in the book. It’s drugs. Mello knows that most of the men he’s been working with are on _something_ most of the time. This is what turns their planets, what keeps the axis spinning, the cycle going.

This is shit for desperate people.

And so, in a sense, he belongs. 

It’s a young girl, that they run into. To Mello, she’s not _terribly_ young. Probably fourteen years old, just a few years younger than himself. 

“Fuck,” Jose mutters, and Mello knows this one’s going to be bad. “Kids are the fucking worst.” But she’s not that much older than he is, and they grab her, force her to the ground and cuff her. She screams—why the hell wouldn’t she? And Mello’s right there with them, yelling, pushing her, forcing her into a chair and tying her down. 

And still, she screams. It makes his blood run cold, and he swears at her, slaps her in the face, and it stops. 

And Mello sighs. “Did you want to interrogate her, or is this just to send a message?” But fuck, he already knows that this kid doesn’t know shit, that she’s just as useless as any other brat they could have tied up. 

“Just send a message. From the sound of it, she doesn’t know anything. It’s all her father.”

“Alright. I’ll take care of it, then?”

“Yeah. We’ll wait outside. You don’t need a show, right?” 

“Yeah.”

When he approaches her, she tenses. She doesn’t know what to expect, because he’s not that much older than her. In fact, they could be the same age, she thinks. His hair is blond, and the slivers of light make his hair shine like he’s an angel.

She tells him he’s pretty, and Mello brings his arm back and pistol whips her, _hard_. It’s sloppy, he doesn’t quite know how to do it right, but she yelps, sucks in a shaky breath, and before she can scream, he hits her again. Again, again, again, until blood’s splattered on his knuckles and she’s stopped moving, her form is hardly _breathing_ , and he knows he should have just shot her. He should have done it quick, gotten it over with, but he needed that look in her eyes. That fear, that sheer, hopeless terror. 

For a split second, he _needed_ the violence.

He fires one bullet into her skull, finishing it, and when he turns around, no one says a word. Perhaps it was the look on his face. Perhaps, he had completely fucking snapped, and no one else would have gone that far. 

But words rang in his head, and he had something to prove. He wasn’t a half rate. He didn’t _slack_. If they gave him a job, he’d fucking do it. 

He’d coat his hands in blood again and again, if that mean getting what he fucking wanted.

~~

He forgets that Matt’s home. In fact, he forgets that Matt’s been holed up in his apartment for nearly a month, sitting on his computer, smoking, gaming, working. He expects to be fuming, but by the time he gets back to the apartment, his chest is aching and he’s exhausted. Blood’s still on his knuckles, her face, smashed in, bloody, broken, still sits behind his eyes, and he knows he shouldn’t have, knows that he should have just done it fucking _quick_.

“ _Sorry, I just think you’re really pretty…_ ”

He opens and shuts the door with hardly any noise, and Mello’s a damned mess before he’s even got his shoes and coat all the way off. He can feel Matt’s eyes on him, whether or not they really are, and he unloads his gun, throws it on the counter, and all but stumbles into the bathroom. 

He vomits. Vomits until he’s seeing colored spots in front of his vision, until he’s shaking, puking up nothing but water, and he doesn’t even realize that he’s sobbing, a fucking mess on the frigid tile floor. 

And as quickly as it comes, it vanishes. The bathroom door creaks open, and Matt’s leaning against the frame, PSP tucked away in his back pocket. Mello’s hand fumbles to flush the toilet, and he’s back on his feet, brushing his teeth, pushing mint toothpaste against his teeth his tongue his gums until he’s spitting it out mixed with blood, and his mouth throbs. When he turns around, Matt’s got his hand outstretched, two unmarked pills in his palm.

“They’ll help.”

So Mello takes them.

Matt just stands, silent, observing.

“Mels?” 

He exhale a breath he didn’t even know he was holding in. “Uhuh?” His heart’s pounding a mile a fucking minute in his chest, but if Matt says these damned things are going to work, then they’ll work. 

“Wanna go for milkshakes?” 

Mello gets it, because Matt still doesn’t like to go outside, and Matt knows that he’s not going to talk about it, no matter what the redhead asks, so this is their only out.

“Yeah.” 

And Mello washes his hands. Once, twice, thrice, as if that’ll do a goddamned thing. 

~~

Matt knows someone’s dead before Mello’s even all the way in the apartment. His hunch is worse than usual, he lurks silently, truly silently—a feat in and of itself for the blond—right out of sight. 

Mello doesn’t need to know that Matt slipped him a couple pills of Vallium, and Mello sure as hell doesn’t need to spill everything that happened in the last eight hours. Matt does stupid shit to cope, so he might as well bring Mello out to do some stupid shit, too. 

In the car, he drives a little too fast and rests his hand on Mello’s forearm. His friend sits tense, frighteningly still, stiff, and doesn’t say a goddamned word. 

He gets it, that Mello wants power. That Mello wants to succeed, to _win_. But he can see the circles under the blond’s eyes, so much deeper than when they were at the orphanage. He sees the way that Mello jumps at even the slightest noise, how he’s always on his guard, working himself into the ground. 

Mello’s hand ghosts over his rosary in a silent prayer, and Matt doesn’t dare tell him that he doesn’t think that’s worth shit. 

They get to the restaurant, a shitty, rundown place in downtown LA, and Matt orders them a chocolate and a peanut butter milkshake. 

He kicks at Mello’s legs under the table until the blond forces out a laugh and slings his leg up onto Matt’s lap, letting the redhead press his fingers to his ankle.

“I want to go to Venice Beach tomorrow,” Mello murmurs, and Matt nods. 

“Anything you want.”

“We’ll leave in the morning.”

“Okay.”

“Lets bring lunch, we’ll make sandwiches. It’s supposed to be warm.”

“If that’s what you want.”

Mello laughs, and for a split second, Matt thinks the blond is about to burst into tears.

~~

At night, Mello’s on the couch, drifting in and out of sleep, begging, praying to rest. But he knows he won’t, so he’s up on his feet, at Matt’s door.

It’s a fucking terrible habit, and he’s already done it once, and that should be enough. But still, here he is, jamming a bobby pin into the lock, because the fucking idiot sleeps like the dead and it’s not like knocking is going to wake him. 

In a pair of boxers and a loose t shirt, he slides under the bed, glad that Matt doesn’t stir. That is, until he’s completely settled into bed. 

“Mels?” 

“Shut up, I’m trying to sleep,” he grumbles, but inches closer to the redhead when he rolls over, trying to make out his features in the pitch black of the room. 

“Mels.” More demanding this time. 

“Mm.”

“Can I hold you?” 

Matt’s quiet, but when he speaks, he’s blunt.“Let me roll over. I don’t need you breathing all over my fucking face.” But still, he doesn’t say no, and he lets Matt slide one arm under his neck, the other falling over his waist. 

It’s far too warm, for a September evening, and their apartment seems to trap all the heat inside the only time they don’t fucking need it, but with Matt’s evened breathing tickling the back of his neck, he really doesn’t mind. 

It doesn’t surprise him, that he yearns for these touches, that he embraces the comfort Matt offers him. 

There’s some things that, despite the circumstances around them, refuse to change. 

“Hey, Mels?”

“Mm.”

“Let’s go to the beach now.”

“Don’t be fucking stupid, I’m exhausted.”

He feels Matt shrug against him. “Okay.”

“In a few hours.”

“Yeah, in a few hours.”


End file.
